the galah

yes 6 in that 3 year old race. 2, 2 year old races at auckland at addington,both being run with 5 horse fields,as per normal. your right about the obsession with 2 year old racing. you know,hrnz are chosing to pay the $12,000 bonus out to the connections and breeders of just one of the 120 horses who race on friday night at addington,or just one of the 72 horses connections that race at auckland on friday.. they could have instead used that $12,000 to pay $100 to the connections of every starter at addington. Thats $67 extra to every owner and $33 to every breeder of a starter on friday. and at auckland they could haveused the $12000 to pay an extra $110 to every owner and $55 to every breeder of a starter at auckland,instead of paying just 1 lot of connections. those 2 year old races already have good stakes,but hrnz continue to prioritise the people who race and breed 2 year olds,as they obviously view them of far,far greater importance than any other group.

you do realise that what you've posted appears rather contradictory. the first half of your post describes the realities of,well to quote you,"all around the world horse racing is struggling and in particular harness racing". You then accurately described some of the reasons for that,which are applicable to nz harness racing. but then,the second half of your post is a story ,which you infer,could be used to reflect the average people in nz harness racing. To quote you "his business went from strength to strength and he had to take on more staff to handle the growing volume,business was very good". Then you ended your post with the the inference that people who express opinions ,similar to what you did in the first half of your post, somehow contribute to the sports decline,if those people go one step further and criticise administrators who ignore the realities. i think your post recent post just is a reflection of whats worked for you in your life.fair enough. but theres a difference between someone making decisions and those who are impoacted by decisions. Its like your ,yes ,make the hard decisions when you have to,but lets not bring the mood down just yet ,lets put off the day of reckoning as long as we can,because that will delay the negative impact on the people concerned. The problem with that type of thinking is,the impact will happen,now or later,people adjust now or later,but if its not life threatening,your left with the people impacted no longer trusting those that weren't up front.

i thought it was pretty hard to have,even with the driver change. It had finished a beaten off last,just stopping,being 40 lengths,6 lengths and 40 lengths behind the second last horses in its last 3 starts. i think opening it at $30 most probably had priced the driver change in. well done if you backed it,your a punting genius today.

i like your thinking gamma. whats that old quote"we cannot solve our problems with the same thinking(or people) as when we created them".

I had to laugh when they interviewed pre race,the trainer of the winner ,bettor reaction. Now i'm sure he was being honest when he said he expected his son would go back at the start with his horse. I think that would have given punters who backed debrief real confidence as its drive rindicted he expected to go forward. well turned out the opposite happened to what the people interviewed said. . actually thats the second time i've heard the trainer of bettor reaction interviewed and the second time he said it would be going back at the start,only to see it in front early in the race. yes $12,000 seems a lot to lose to me. Maybe they have plenty to lose.Someone put $1000 on the telfer winner,secrets abound ,the night before in the junior driver race paying $8. maybe that was the same person.

it will be interesting,once the new law comes into effect, how much more will be bet through the tab on racing and sports and how that will flow through into increased returns for racing here. hopefully the positive impacts will far outweigh the negative for example a hegative impact could be there are nz people who also have tabcorp accounts and bet into their tote pools.Given they are not big at the moment,any decrease would mean their pools would get to a point where they are very unattactive for aussies to bet on. I used to spend on a tabcorp account just so to spread the impact of even a $20 or more bet on the price. so its not as if you start transferring that spend onto a small nz pool.. Hopefully it all turns out as they are predicting.

you mention db,last year db had a drop in operating profit of25%. they laid off staff including 60 at one of their main breweries.lion lost $46 million. i like that your trying to be positive,but its not the reality on the ground amongst the silent majority. its interesting that earlier you were advocating for more slot races,which remember,hrnz is now pumping funds into and then you were also saying $15,000 maidens at addington is too much. personally I struggle to see how prioritising the small % who operate at the elite level over the 90% who operate at the lower levels,will lead to anything other than people getting out of the sport and not breeding. And thats what is happening. People just look at the hrnz website news and evaluate who they think the industry is prioritising and then they are saying,well thats not me ,i'm already struggling,its not going to get any better for m,e so reluctantly those people start getting rid of their broodmares and many others,already in the background in different parts of the sport,are fading out of sight.

So what we are discussing falls under the amendment to section 98 of the act. so,reading between the lines, it appears that it may have been to do with the tab originally having to place greater restrictions to prevent problem or harm gambling,whcih they may have felt were unrealistic or difficult to enforce. in other words it would have been too easy for the regulatory bodies who oversee compliance,to pick up things which the tab may have viewed as being over the top oversight. it appears section 98a, relating to consumer protection,where the issue of taking larger bets from winning punters,would appear to fall under,may have got a small amendment,but not specifically the amount people can get on for? actually reading that act where it says"the intensity of betting by a person using an online betting system provided by the tab,including the frequency at which successive bets may be placed." well that rings a bell with me as to the most likely reason betfair closed my account about 3 years ago. I opened a betfair account,put about $100 with the theory that if i backed favoured dogs to lose, who consistently jumped poor and got back early and drew poor as well on tracks with 2 turns.i did that for about 2 months, i backed on every dog race in australia,which was about every 3 minutes most nights. i did that for about 4 hours each night. i only did a couple of minutes study for each race.Well it was all going well and after about 2 months i had turned my $100 into about $5,000,then i got got a bit too clever and one night bet on a couple of tracks with only 1 turn and ones that were paying more,and would you believe it,i backed 6 dogs in a row to lose paying double figures, within half an hour and they all won. Bugga me,could you believe it. So that left me only a few hundred again. Well,the next day betfair closed down my account.They refused to say why,i had made some money overall and it annoyed me. So i waited and then my wife opened an account. I was doing ok,i just decided to bet on nz harness as the aussie dogs thing just seemed a bit too intense for my brain to switch off when i went to sleep. Well my wife decided to withdraw some money ,they wouldn't let her,it said phone them. Then,as soon as she spoke to them they just closed her account and sent out the funds that were in there.they gave no reason and just said ,we don't have to tell you why. so thats a long story,but i can see now,even though i wasn't a losing punter on betfair,i fell within the scope of who they had to restict or close the account. you can see why horse racing is struggling with some of the strict oversight rules. Some seem over the top, when its obvious people aren't losing much and are just having a bit of fun.Compare how they want to control peoples gambling ,but your free to do many other more harmful things. the british horse racing industry is an obvious exampleIt seem to be struggling with the main blame being laid on over the top harm regulations..its been reported recently that average turnover per race was down 8% compared with 2023/2024 and dowjn 15% compared with the year prior.. in 2007 they estimated 17% of the uk public regularly bet on the horses,but they reckon that only about 10% do these days.soccer is the most popular sport to bet on there,with racing close behind,then a big drop to the likes of golf,cricket and rugby.but soccer and racing gamblers average spend a month is about half of what gamblers spend on the other sports mentioned.Apparently betting on fantasy sports is getting rather popular.

i thought the racing amendment bill is to change several things,the most prominent being making it illegal for off shore gambling companies to take bets from new zealanders. the refusing bets thing ,well is seems the select committeee in parliament had made recommendations limiting the tab refusing to take bets,the tab wasn't happy with that,so lobbied peters to keep their ability to restrict punters. mow i don't know whether that would have meant under the original draft,punters like brodie would have got on for more if they wanted,i haven't been able to find the original draft. But it sounded like mr peters was being asked by the tab to stop punters getting on for bigger amounts. thats why i was wondering how does that effect punters. were some winning punters done a disservice by mr peters?

whats with the ffs?. so you think entain losing hundreds of millions in penalties,as predicted, because of the austrac prosecution is a small change issue. tell entain shareholders that. I'm sure they would be pleased to know. One of your strangest and biggest over reaction replies you've made.. Are you having a bad hair day?

Yes,not much was reported about anything he said as entain ceo,about nz harness racing,in nz.At least that was my impression as well. maybe that was just the way it worked. one of the few things we did get media coverage about what he had said,was how he pushed the 2 year old bonuses and guaranteeing running races,despite small field sizes . Wel,that was a self serving policy,that could be argued created a perception that contributed to less people breeding their mares. But entain has done many good things,better trackside coverage,more racing which means more income . its hrnz who are spending the money like theres no tommorow.

Its interesting just how much some people spend at these betting agencies isn't it. in one article it says the australian agency in charge of oversight of betting found enatin allowed 17 high risk customers to spend $152 million. it didn't say over what timeframe,but seems to have been in the last 5 years. And some criminals where funnelling "dirty" money through accounts.what a surprise. Seems some drug dealers like to have a bet as well as to money launder..Maybe they could use my account,i don't mind.

there was an article on "the post" from a few days ago,which was headlined racing amendment bill,what it means for sport ,racing and betting offshore. i don't know how the put that type of thing on here,but it was interesting enough. Whats the post,never heard of that myself. how much of the $100 million goes to racing .they say 20 million of that will go to a sports group to distribute to sports organisations. looks like basketball will be a big winner. i read a headline of another article a month ago about winston peters seeking to remove restrictions on the tab refusing bets,from the new racing bill. its sounds like it had been looking like they were going to make the tab accept more bets that are currently refused,but the tab lobbied peters to allow them not to. anyone know what they were going to do but now aren't, since peters may have caved to the tabs request. anyone know much about that. for some reason things that effect racing seems to be given coverage in mainstream media more than racing media sometimes.

Discussing drivers is always something i find interesting.Both you and i have seen plenty over the years and i'm sure we know what we are talking about. we disagree on b graham.i did used to bet on horses she drove quite a bit,and i formed my opinions around that.i had a good oopinion of her driving skills and integrity.Sometimes she didn't seem to drive,maybe she was on trackside presentling,but her father seemed to take over the stable drives and his horses just didn't run for him like they did for her and he was more a stop /start driver and they aren't the good ones. all those other drivers you mention,all great drivers. I know you like g dixon,but i just see him team driving too much to be a fan. But i'm defintely a fan of how he has handled leap to fame and his driving of him. One of the greatest combinations ever. i think b orange is the best driver in australasia. You rate others above him,fair enough,i just put him on top because you know he not only has the skills,but is always trying.Sure, occasionally over burn on horses sometimes,but hes doing that because hes trying to get into a position to get the best placing at a time when the pace is slackest,not just go around to run at the back,waiting for 2 or 3 weeks time. P mcmullen seems to do the same in queensland.Hes your best,as you say. What more can a punter ask for. what i find off putting about queensland harness racing is you seem to have so many drivers who are related to each other or in relationships with each other. And it shows when they drive against each other.Thats a consequence of an industry erodes its base of industry participants.Thats happening here and will impact peoples perception of the industry down the track.

so,going by how many meetings they have, addington will take a hit of close to half a million when the greyhounds are finished. Thats a lot of money.

actually at the end of the day theres a lot of realities that won't change and have to be accepted,so you have to plan around those realities and not make false promises or give out false hope. There is a sustainable way forward for sure,but are the policies currently being implemented leading us there? its best to just tell it as it is,i hope this committee does that.

Well the fact that we are speculating what the thoroughbred majority committee will be advising the minister on,is of some concern from a harness perspective. For example,will they be looking at the distribution % model for the codes from turnovers generated overseas. Who knows,but thats something the thoroughbred people have always wanted changed.Maybe all these extra meetings hrnz have been having, has been a means to increase overall turnover on the basis that there may be changes to the distribution model in the future. But i would guess,with the greyhounds going ,that may be looked at,but its only a guess. i guess they will be looking at how to maximise turnover from dates and the thoroughbreds will say,well we generate the most so we will be entitiled to the best dates,but they already get them anyway,so i don't see the dates thing being impacted much. the gallops have an issue with lots of abandonments meetings,but i don't see how an advisory committee can come up with solutions that the thoroughbred industy hasn't already tried. But i guess they will point out the financial impact of those abandonments. will they make recommendations around tracks like the messara report. I would guess they will keep away from that.who knows Some of the people on that committee haveinterests in the breeding,will they comment on that. Thouroughbreds interests i would expect will have more influence with peters,but they are the larger group so thats not unexpected. In 2018 they had an advisory group,made up of some of the same people,come up with a report,after the messara thing. Looking at where we are,did that help much? what would i personally want to see. i want to see an analysis of whether both codes are being fiscally responsible with the funding they have been receiving,whether the current level of stakemoney being paid out is sustainable,i would like to see recommendations around establishing performance based employment contracts for those leading each industry. What do you think chief.

I agree with you about wondering whether she will last here because of the weather. It must be a lot easier getting out of bed with your lovely climate.

thats an interesting take on her driving skills. Like i have said previously,when covid shut down all harness racing for close to 3 months in nz in march 2020,i changed my focus to queensland harness racing and did my own reviews of every race run in that state for about 6 months. So i saw quite a lot of her driving skills,and formed the opinion she was one of the best drivers over there as she tried every time,horses i thought clearly ran for her , she made good tactical decisions and she drove kind,which meant her horses would back up. In my opinion,the opposite applied to her father,who i had not much confidence in to get the best results from his drives.I remember when i did comment along those lines previously on here,you replied about how successful her father has been,and i don't doubt you about that, as i really didn't know too much about him prior to my focus for that 6 month period,but from my observations i thought it obvious horses didn't run for him like they did for his daughter.. my analysis of queensland harness racing was accurate i believe,as i did make a profit overall,its just it wasn't to the level that justified the time. I probably would have carrired on spending the $2000 a day on queensland harness racing if the tab had given me the rebates they said i would get,but they changed the rules and said the account i used didn't qualify for their elite thing,even though they had told me previously,spend x amount and you will qualify. That was just another example of the tab screwing me over and them trying to save a few hundred a month,which was part of the reason i have significantly cut back what i spend these days. Also,you comment on what queensland harness drivers may say about her driving,and i'm not doubting you,but to me,from what i observed,you had a lot of drivers just going around to earn their driving fee with a preconceived plan to just follow them around and get their horses down in the ratings, so in the future they may end up in a race,with a draw,where they would try. in my opinion,nz harness racing is a more honest product than queensland . I'm sure i started a couple of threads on drivers who did that in queensland one time. anyways,i not here to be a cheerleader for grahams driving skills,you would have observed her over years,not 6 months like me,but nevertheless, i do have a different opinion to yours about her driving skils.

i quite like hearing the drivers just before the start as it can give an indication of whether they are going forward or back at the start,which sometimes influences who you pick sometimes. i've noticed nearly all drivers say their horses have warmed up good when asked how they feel. But thats also good to know. personally id prefer if they spook to a wide variety of drivers than just the same ones,irrespective of whether the drivers speak well or not. the only issue i have with those pre race interviews is you feel sorry for the presenters who do it at night when its really cold.

tu tangata has had 1 win in its last 50 starts. I just looked at his recent starts as far as faovoritism goes and hes been win favorite 5 times in his last 15 starts but never won as favorite.. he has at times been unlucky,but on those occassions its looked like poor tactical driving decisions,but the more you watch him the more you realise he just lacks a bit of high speeed and that would make tactical moves a bit harder in races. he would be a nice horse to own as he pays his way for sure,but i would be surprised if he did that well in queensland. because he runs in the first 4 a lot,he has taken a while to drop back into a grade where he can win here.

yes the dixons and the mcmullens are very talented. But team driving is one of the main things which turns punters off the harness product. Galloping trainers can have 3 or 4 in a race,but you never hear of team riding. and its not just punters who are turned off by team driving. Those who are on the receiving end of team driving,whether they be owners or trainers view it very negatively. As to the southern racing. Yes,i like your training tips. Makes sense too me. As to the topic of having more racing in winter in southland to keep things ticking over financially for all those involved. Well,if we put to one side,whether its a good idea or not,what strikes me about HRNZ promoting this,is don't they realise how contradictory their decision making has been. like,for southland,HRNZ are saying they want no canterbury horses to race in southland in the southern surge races and have programmed race conditions to that effect. Yet when it comes to canterbury, they run some races with the opposite conditions. In other words races in canterbury that are for only horses trained south of the waitaki river. And then you have hrnz consitently saying they want to see more canterbury horses racing in auckland. But wait,theres mores HRNZ contradictions. They want to keep southland harness racing ticking over all year around fior the good of the industry there,but when it comes to the central districts they have just compressed their racedays into a six month period,with nothing in the other half of the year. its very confusing.And i think the reasion for the contradictory approaches ,depending on which region it is,is an indication that HRNZ policy makers really are confused and end up just placating groups who make the loudest noise or complain the most.Thats seems to be there approach to everything.

i used to watch the people that bet at one particular busy pub tab that had the most pokies. the best way to sum up the difference, was the people who bet on the horses would have a drink,sometimes a meal and would get a taxi home. the people that bet on the pokies mostly would not have meals,sometimes would have a drink and if they didn't have their own car,would rather spend their last few dollars on the pokies,then walk home in the rain in the middle of winter. also i got to know some who had compulsions when it came to the polkies. they said how the pokies is all about you and the machine and their is no social interaction like you get from betting on the horses. also,young people today do a lot of on line betting. thats how they get started and sometimes addicted. Currently the nz government is going through the process of allowing up to 15 companies,most of which are expected to be from overseas,to operate on line casino licencesd.the government is saying they need to regulate what is currently not regulated,that way they will have greater control.They come in to play from next year But quite rightly you would think,that has concerned nz community groups who get grants from gambling profits at the likes of pubs,as they believe that the on line competition will result in their funds providers not capturing their current market share ,therefore having less to give away in grants. then you have sky casino and the tab also saying that people will gamble on these on line casinos instead of products they provide and that it will impact them. Therein is another possible unwanted curve ball that may impact racing as thats more competition for the gambling dollar.

Surely queensland galloping people have heard of leap to fame. It used to be horse racing people everywhere were well aware of great horses,no matter what the code.But maybe times have changed.Personally i know of no one in harness,including myself, who knows much about australian gallops horses.I'm sure there are some that do,but i just don't know them. Having said that i still bet on them some days for something to do. Just as i'm sure some australian punters do on nz harness. Anyways,NZ harness would get some sky racing channell 1 coverage,between australian gallops meetings sometimes,and especially around your late afternoon.so people would see it sometimes,even if not many bet on it. And i just had a look at the tabcorp pools for today.A midweek meeting at Dalby gallops had win pools of $7,000 in their first couple of races and $10,000 in their third. Tthats the only queensland gallops meeting on today. I would assume it gets a wee bit more pre race coverage,so going on what you say,i guess even queensland gallops gets little interest from queensland people if mid week. you mention leap to fame. He won at the weekend. But they had a group 3, 2 year old race earlier that night. i watched it. grant dixon had a horse that was heavily backed into $1.60. the 2nd favorite was in front and the 3rd favorite,the only other horse given any chance by punters was another dixon trained runner,at the back on the outside. So what did g dixon do,he came out of the 1/1,kept applying pressure so they ended up running the first half faster than the final half,and hey it worked,the dixon trained runner at the back swept past the leaders and won easily,with g dixon on the hot favorite,stopping late for fourth.. Now i don't know whether g dixon deliberately sacrificed his own chance or simply over estimated his horses ablity,but anyone who watched that race would have come to the conclusion, the race was obvious team driving. so what i'm saying there,is if you watch queensland harness,punters seem to be taken for fools by some participants and ,quite bluntly,would not trust they were getting a fair go, so would quickly lose interest. why cant people just drive to get the best possible placing instead of sacrificing their own chances for another stable runner.Don't they realise the harm they are doing to how the sport is perceived. thats whats going to be nz harness racings biggest issue in years to come. Only the big stables are doing ok and will continue participating and people will see more and more team driving and punters will disengage. Gammalite,if you follow the form in southland,you would see theres a lot of tired horses who look like they badly need a spell. look at the a hunter trained horses,he lines them up every week but evry one is racing well below their best in recent weeks. Theres lots of them/ Xerion a kirk larsen trained trotter,why its still racing i'm not sure as every week it goes a bit worse. They lots and lots like that down there i could name. remember southland harness racing used to close down for2-3 months and when they did that they had probably 300-500 more horses trained in the province. It was only 30 years ago they would have 240 at some trials meetings down there. They would come up to canterbury if they wanted to race over winter. yet now they want them to race all year around when they have about 1/4 to 1/3 of the number of horses. That makes no sense to me.

so does anyone have the figures as regards income lost from the harness tracks that currently host greyhound racing? i feel sorry for the greyhound people and you would think they deserve some type of government compensation ,but wouldn't it be fair to expect the government to also compensate the harness clubs for the lost income. Probably wishful thinking.Whats hrnz doing to negotiate with the government as far as that goes,or are they doing nothing or is it all hush hush like so many. An issue that just blows in the wind and only for the ears of those its job is to spin jn a way that shows them in a positive light. They also say the equivalent of 355 people in canterbury are currently employed . I read recently about the substantial cost one trainer had incurred to relocate to aussie. currently addington,cambridge,manawatu and southland have greyhound clubs paying to host racing. addington must have significnat current inclme that they wont be getting from the end of july next year. And whats the turnover % gained from having no greyhounds. i read that grnz annual report for 2023 stated that tab turnover from greyhound racing was 361 million,representing 14.2% of its domestic and 23.3% of its overseas turnover. so exactly how much do nz punters spend on aussie greyhounds and what % or $ amount will end up coming back to harness racing. And greyhounds obviously contribute to tab running costs and the likes of the rib. Is anyone going to tell people at any point,the scale of the impact of greyhound closing will have on harness.